Question about Side by Side

[kylera]

When capturing screenshots or music, how is it done? Are the games emulated on PC, then screen-captured/recorded, or did the reviewers actually take the trouble to hook up machines via video-in?

[Melf]

I take all my shots via emulator, as I lack a capture card to use actual hardware. I take audio samples that way as well.

Joe Redifer's are the most awesome because he takes his shots and audio samples from actual hardware. Ah, the benefits of modern technology!

[Joe Redifer]

Actually I grab my screenshots from emulators just because of the RAW capture abilities. I'd do video input, but I can't input component video into my computer at this time, and composite and s-video captures from the Genesis seem to be extremely oversaturated for some reason. But the sound is all from real hardware. In the future I'd love to be able to include short video clips of relevant scenes for each system being compared. I base my articles on playing them on real hardware, though. It sure is a pain to play through some games again just to get screenshots of a certain scene. I had to play through both Exiles all over again from beginning to end on an emulator to get screens. Ug.

Trivia: There are some pics somwhere on the site of Genesis Virtua Racing. I did those with video capture (s-video), so I guess the oversaturation isn't too bad.

[Benjamin]

My last two reviews' images were captured with my new and way beyond finicky Leadtek TV2000 Expert video card. I loathe playing emulators and hated having to resort to using them for prior screenshots, scouring the Internet for some adware plagued site for a ROM of a game I already own. It's great to have a passthrough device that will allow you to play the game as intended while taking pictures automatically every few seconds. Unfortunately, while the quality is terrific for the price, the video card is a major pain to install, and a recent format is holding my next batch of pictures for reviews hostage at the moment.